Police: Man urinating on teen leads to gun scare at movie theater

A gun scare at Bridgeport Village sent shoppers into a state of panic.

It all started inside of the Regal Cinemas just after 6 p.m. on Friday. The audience was watching the final minutes of the movie Prisoners, when a man stood up and urinated on a teenage boy sitting in the row in front of him.

In the ensuing chaos, someone yelled "gun," according to investigators.

"Everyone in the movie theater just started saying something about a gun, and then everyone just started leaving frantically," said witness Justin Bartlett.

The call for help came into to 911 dispatchers as a disturbance with a gun inside of a movie theater at Bridgeport Village, triggering a massive response from multiple agencies rushing to get to the theater in time.

"We saw cops running down the street with assault rifles," said witness Phillip Quinn. "I was really scared, I called my mom right away and told her."

Investigators tell FOX 12 they quickly figured out what happened after talking to the 14-year-old boy and his family.

According to police, it was a woman who suffers from PTSD that saw the confrontation, and for some reason screamed the word "gun" multiple times in the middle of the theater, triggering a mass evacuation.

"Obviously with the recent shootings going on, just the mention of the word gun, I find it strange how on edge people seem, and how easily it can turn into a situation when the SWAT team comes out," said Bartlett.

The elderly man was not arrested, and the family chose not to press charges. Police say the man is no longer allowed back into the Regal Cinemas at Bridgeport Village.

Investigators believe alcohol may have contributed to the man's actions.

Tigard Police say the situation served as good practice for how they would respond in the event of an actual mall shooting, adding that everything went according to plan.